Life of Verse Is Not as Long, Study Says

From Ernest Hemingway to Sylvia Plath and Virginia Wolff, the literary world has long had its share of tortured, depressed souls. But poets, says one San Bernardino psychology professor, die younger than playwrights and nonfiction writers.

The study, conducted by James Kaufman of the Learning Institute at Cal State San Bernardino, looked at 1,987 dead writers from the U.S., China, Eastern Europe and Turkey from the 4th century to the present day. Kaufman classified them as poets, playwrights, fiction writers and nonfiction writers.

On average, nonfiction writers died at 68, novelists at 66, playwrights at 63 and poets at 62, Kaufman said. He did not study causes of death.

“I was surprised at the difference of almost six years between poets and nonfiction writers,” Kaufman said. “It’s kind of hard to explain.”

Citing other studies and more than two decades of research in the field of creativity and mental illness, Kauffman said there might be several reasons why poets live shorter lives than their literary counterparts.

Kauffman said studies have concluded that poets -- especially the women -- are more prone to mental illness.

Because of its highly introspective and personal nature, poetry may draw the most unstable of creative types, he said.

One mundane explanation, Kauffman said, may be that poets tend to be successful at a younger age than other writers.

“Poets can die at 18 and we’ll know who they are,” said Dean Simonton, whose 1975 study on age and achievement used a smaller sample but came to a conclusion similar to Kauffman’s.

But “we may never even hear of” a novelist who dies before achieving fame and who would therefore not be included in such studies, Simonton said.

USC English professor Carol Muske-Dukes, a poet, couldn’t help but chuckle at the study.

“I find that hard to believe,” she said. “This is one of those scholarly studies that makes no sense. The way poets write has nothing to do with their health.”

Kaufman stressed that there are many exceptions to the trend suggested by his data.

“The study is certainly very significant, but it doesn’t mean that every poet dies young,” he said. “It’s not like there should be some type of tobacco-like warning on poetry classes. Poetry is not bad for your health.”